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Judy Jetson Loves Dudes: A supercut

 

But for real, it was progressive of Hanna-Barbera to allow Judy Jetson to be this promiscuous without facing shaming or derision. Maybe it's regrettable that dudes are all she was into, but whatever. She's a cartoon not a role model!

Also, she seems to have a taste for gay men, which is also kind of progressive.

The worst song I heard this weekend

 

...But also, the best.

This is from the god-awful TV movie Rockin' with Judy Jetson, in which a song written by the prematurely greying daughter of George for a pop star who is not Jet Screamer, ends up getting mixed up with alien gibberish (just like what happened with Jet Screamer!). It becomes a huge hit and Judy gains tons of fans based on her counterfeit songwriting talents. This is maybe the most ridiculously optimistic view of the future that The Jetsons ever offered. More than flying cars!

I watched this, by the way, because I'm working on a Jetsons-based project that I'll post in a few days and then create a sense of Jetsons overload on this blog. Sorry. I thought this was too horrendous not to share.

Dancin' on Air

A few weekends ago, a Philadelphia station aired a four-episode marathon of Dancin' on Air, a teen-oriented dance show that aired from 1981-1987 (it was Dance Party USA's predecessor and then sister show). Before and after commercials during this string of very special reruns, they'd cut to various dancers who kept this show going back in the day. One of them said that this was "the reality show of the '80s." That claim sat alongside ones of them still being recognized, 30 years later, in supermarkets, so I was ready to dismiss it along with those. But the more I thought about it, the more I agreed. Many of the ideals present on Dancin' on Air have become reality show dogma. Already strange-looking people have clearly gone out of their way to make themselves look stranger. No discernible talent is necessary to participate. There's a palpable struggle for camera time that is rewarded by outlandishness. In its polite and simple way, Dancin' on Air predicted our cultural adoration of extreme human behavior.

It was also run really weirdly, although I'm not complaining: pop curios (like Taffy's Italo "I Love My Radio") were featured alongside smash hits. Also, concepts the cut-in dance above certainly introduced layers missing from your standard kids-dancing-in-a-room programming. And who doesn't want to know what turns underage children off?

The performance of Jennifer Lopez's career?

I put together this reel (for work) of Jennifer Lopez being slightly squirmy but mostly composed whenever Marc Anthony was mentioned during her July 4 weekend appearance on HSN. In retrospect, it's pretty obvious that they had already split and it was just a matter of announcing it, but I do appreciate her poise and relative sincerity. Also, it is funny when celebrities are put on the spot and have to exhibit grace on live television. I'm telling you, home-shopping networks are the final frontier of celebrity honesty since they don't have the human safety nets that are publicists holding their hands and they have to talk and talk and talk sometimes for hours on end. That is why my commitment to sifting through it remains unyielding.

Also, she wants to be a cat.

Have a slutacious weekend!

  

This may be the only existing video interview of short-lived female sex-rap trio H.W.A. and with good reason: they're such liars! What's above (more classic footage from Slammin' Rap) is three minutes of spin. Baby Girl, Jazzy and Diva D look like they walked off an '80s Jersey shore postcard and completely misrepresent their slutacious image, explaining that the "Hoes" part of Hoes With Attitude "is businesswomen--women making money at whatever they're selling. We're selling records." First of all, no they weren't. They didn't sell shit! Also, I think in this case "hoe" means "one who has cognitive dissonance." I've heard mildly persuasive arguments for the reclaiming of the word "bitch," but this just seems like the product of low self-esteem. So that's sad. On the other hand, it's very egalitarian of them to imply that bathing suits can be just as powerful as business suits. Or maybe they just know nothing! Hard to say. Anyway, they go on to claim their song "Funk Me" is about dancing (and not being...funked) and that, "We're not selling sex, we're selling sexy." That makes as much sense as an actual hooker saying, "I'm not selling blowjobs, I'm selling blowjobbies."

Bonus: You've probably heard 20 Fingers featuring Gillette's minor '90s hit "Short Dick Man," but have you heard her lip synch it uncensored in front of children on Brazilian TV? Either these kids have no idea what she's saying or they, too, don't want no short-dick men. Everyone is way too enthusiastic about this horror show!

 

(Everyone including me.)

(20 Fingers vid is via john__juan on Twitter.)

"I Wanna Go" video review hakiu

Rock of Love girl hair,
Kelly MacNamara eyes:
Brit's "I Wanna Go"

(OK, that's not much of a review. Nor will this be: I like the video because of the Half-Baked references and because it's not Weekend At Britney's III. If she's propped up, you can barely tell!)

Deniece Williams is amazing

The other night, while watching Deniece Williams' Unsung episode, I started tweeting shots from it, and then all of a sudden there were way too many to tweet so I'm putting them in a post. Don't get me wrong, I love Niecy -- if having a good voice qualifies a person as brilliant, she is a genius. Also, there was recent footage of her falling offstage and then getting back up and performing! What a pro! However, the woman's eye makeup and nails alone could have made her a legend. Un. Real. And seeing it in HD only emphasized that. She was made for 1080p; clearly ahead of her time.

You can click on all of these (except the gif) to make them bigger. You'll probably want to do that:

For the love of rock bimbos

 

I don't know what I love more: the word "bimbo" or actual bimbos. Both are wonderful and so very expressive! The highlights reel above comes from the VHS Rock Video Girls, which I guess was also a pay-per-view special? I would pay $49.99 for this, easily. Better than any Tyson fight, for sure. My favorite part out of all my favorite parts is the bit about Bob Dylan and Tom Petty sitting down to pee. Even if the woman between them was mistaken about their positioning, it's a hell of an image.

By the way, if you like this video, I highly recommend Everything is Terrible's WILDLY SPECULATIVE CELEBRITY SEX SECRETS!!! In fact, I recommend that one even if you don't like this one.

I do love a diva

 

Maybe it's the rapid humidity or the fact that Basketball Wives is back on the air (I remain devoted, despite no longer working for VH1), but I'm in the mood for some bitchiness, and one of yesterday's Judge Judy episodes delivered. The case that the clip above concluded involved a woman who sells knock-off bags and belts suing her friend for effectively stealing the counterfeit merchandise. Judy didn't take the plaintiff to task for selling knock-offs, which was weird, but even weirder was the post-ruling exchange. And the weirdest thing about that is how rare it is -- with the amount of mouthy people that go in and out of that courtroom set, you'd think more would argue as they made their way out. Every indication suggests that's just how they live.

Anyway, my favorite thing about this is that it's basically a fight about semantics. The central question is: what makes a diva? Class, apparently. Not stealing your friend's knock-off bags and belts and throwing them in the garbage, particularly. I love that they both agree that being a diva is a good thing, though. As long as they're both on the same page re: divadom, I think it's possible for them to mend their friendship. I hope so for them but especially for us given the potential for future televised cases!

Recent music things

It may not seem like it in these parts, but I'm still very actively reviewing albums. Both up this week at the Village Voice: my takes on Kate Bush's Director's Cut and Lady Gaga's Born This Way. True to form, I like Gaga and love Kate (Director's Cut is my favorite album of the year so far -- it's a lot more fascinating than a rehashing of lesser works may seem).

Just for the fun of it, I rank the Director's Cut reworks after the jump...